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Pam Barnsley
This is my favourite book of the year. The author created characters so compelling that I was completely engrossed in their lives; Glass's insight into human nature is impressive. The plotlines made it difficult to put the book down, and the richness of detail, description, and excellent writing style made it a joy to read.
Kylie Smith
A fantastic novel revealing the commonality of love, life, and relationships through the eyes of three different individuals whose lives merge in an untimely manner. I enjoyed this book as much, if not more, than I enjoyed Michael Cunningham's The Hours. I felt that I had a personal connection with each of the characters, that I shared empathy and congeniality as if I were those characters, or as if those characters were also a part of my life. Julia Glass orchestrates her first novel to the depths of emotion and allows you to feel what her characters feel. I give this book an A+!
reader
I liked this book a lot. It's true, as others have noted, that it's slow and thoughtful. What impresses me so much about it is that the writer seems to really get into the heads of others. More than that, she portrays so well the assumptions, miscommunications and unspoken wonderings we probably all have about people that we are close to. It made me think of all the questions, all the resentments and all the gratitude I will never express to my mother, my brothers, my father. Put another way, it is amazing how close and how far apart we can be in our connections to the most important people in our lives. Another facet of the book that I really enjoyed was the complexity, intelligence and self-doubt of the the main characters. For example, the strong, silent father actually has a rich inner life, silly infactuations and, most of all, always feels that he is somehow out of the inner circle of those who know, are sure, of how life is to be lived. This book is definitely not for those who want action, a plot driven narrative. It is for those who might be enchanted by a walk through the forest, enchanted by the play of light and shadow, by the distance songs of birds and by all the memories of all the other walks in the forest.
MG
Yawn
A fussy sort of book that plods along. I really do not understand the rave reviews. It was difficult to care about the characters. And I agree that the ending was too tidy to digest.
ReadingGroupGuru
Moved Forward but went nowhere
I truly felt the characters went nowhere which is where the plot went as well! We got the most taste of Fenno and even he seemed terribly repressed. I didn't understand the purpose of Tony and Fern at all, they were like parsley garnish on a plate! The rivalry between the siblings was at most a yawn fest and why not tell us if she gets pregnant or not more when it was happening!
sandytwin
Too many loose ends
This book was very slowwwww. What bothered me even more was that there were too many loose ends....nothing ever came full circle. The family has a lot of good story lines that could have been further developed. Instead, new people were introduced and we never got to "know" them. I was not impressed at all.
Jo Carter
I disliked the book for the "jumpy" way it was written. I thought at first, that it would be written about the father, then the three children. However, the way in which it revolved around Fenno, the least likable of all the characters, killed it for me. It was very hard to get through. The only reason I finished it, is because I had just joined a book club and didn't want to be the only one that hadn't finished the book. As it turned out, every single one of us (six total) absolutely detested the book!
rabid reader
I can't understand why it is so popular, either. I couldn't make it beyond the middle of the book, and I really, really tried! The book never kept my attention, although I tried and tried to make it to the end, I just couldn't. Bor----------ring. Very few books have turned me off to this extent.